Ferrari Mailing List: Re: Ferrari Digest, Vol 1, Issue 17

[JAshburne (JAshburne]

About the only good use of police radar around here in CT is the unmanned  
radar displays that are designed to flash your speed at you in order to shame  
you into slowing down.  They may well work for that purpose but I find that  
their best use is to calibrate my speedometer!
 
John
 
 
In a message dated 8/29/2006 6:17:40 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
BRIGANDBAR [at] aol.com writes:

In a  message dated 8/29/2006 3:28:39 P.M. Central Standard Time,   
ferrari-request [at] ferrarilist.com writes:

else  just use  a
decent watch and time the mileage  markers.



Dennis  et. al.

I'd like to add a caveat here.  Most mileage markers,  particularly  those 
simply listing highway mileage on a post without  precision additions such  
as 
decimal point measurements, are  notoriously inaccurate. These are not survey 
 
points, but  informational signals. Additionally, mileage actually traveled 
on a   
roadway may be affected by things such as curves with varying radii, etc.  
And  
then there is always the parallax issue relating to trying to  time points by 
 
visually starting and stopping a timing device. Add  to those "reaction time" 
 
issues in starting and stopping the  chronograph and the error factor is 
further  altered.  Will  these cumulatively result in an error rate of 
+/-10%? Most  
probably  not, but it is difficult to determine if the errors are cumulative, 
 
or  offsetting.  Actually, one of the best ways to determine  actual speed 
(at  
least in some semblance of the legal speed limits,  is to find a friendly 
state  trooper or local police officer who has  an interstate highway within 
his  
jurisdiction and "beat" and simply  ask him to clock the car on radar (while  
setting speed parameters  that do not result in the issuance of a citation). 
If  
this sounds  absurd to you, trust me, after 30 years of experience within the 
  
"community"  prior to retirement from the public sector, and being  married  
to 
a Chief of Police with about the same tenure, I can  assure you that many  
police officers are car enthusiasts such as  ourselves.  And we have a  
pretty 
significant advantage in that  in most jurisdictions these officers have  
probably 
not even seen a  Ferrari at all, let alone in a "close up" perspective.  If 
you really  want to add to their enthusiasm, invite them to ride in the car.  
 
Unless you are in So. CA or an affluent suburb of a major (prosperous)  city  
he/she may be the only officer in the department that has ever  ridden in a  
Ferrari. I the circumstances are appropriate, i.e., if  the officer is a  
neighbor, 
acquaintance, etc., offer his/her kid a  ride. You might even be  surprised 
as 
to exactly what speeds can be  checked without a citation at the  right time 
and  
location.

Dr. Steve